This year we remember John Muir – a man who influenced the preservation of the outdoors – as we reach the 100 year anniversary of his death, and celebrate the legacy he has left behind.

Each year many schools apply for the John Muir Award through the John Muir Trust. A great opportunity for an interdisciplinary topic on the life of John Muir can be facilitated by a fantastic free resource from the Scottish Book Trust. The Scottish Book Trust have produced a graphic novel to depict John Muir’s life as well as lesson plans and teaching notes. This would be ideal as a shared or guided reading text within midlle/upper Primary and lower Secondary.

CLICK HERE – Scottish Book Trust John Muir Resources

At the International Literacy Day conference on September 4th in Glasgow the Scottish Book Trust led an excellent presentation and workshop. As well as initiatives such as Bookbug and the Scottish Book Awards they also provide direct support for practitioners.

CLICK HERE for teaching resources tailored to each of the Curriculum for Excellence levels

CLICK HERE for the Authors Live section of the website – packed full of videos from the authors that children love

CLICK HERE for their blog designed for Teachers and Librarians

CLICK HERE for a menu of online CPD videos

Thank you to Sara Macaskill at Knockbreck Primary who informed this post.

The Literacy through Exploration PowerPoint within the Literacy Toolkit allows practitioners to investigate play based learning experiences, beyond the boundaries of the Early Years.

Opening a Literacy Surgery allows just that . . .

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Learners – equipped with their surgical gloves, mask and utensils – can put the grammar, spelling and language skills that they’ve learned into an active context.

Perhaps you want them to form contractions, make common words or even create sentences. A Literacy Surgery is a great technique that can be used to provide learners with the experience of developing these skills. The photo slideshow highlights some possible ideas; however, click the Pinterest image below to explore  the concept further.

You may also wish to CLICK HERE for free publications from Pearson which can be used to inform your teaching of language skills.

The books in each of the three categories – 3-7 years, 8-11 years and 12-16 years –  have been announced for the 2014 Scottish Book Awards. When searching for a new class text, why not use these as text for shared reading. Read all three, and ask learners to vote for their favourite . . .

CLICK HERE to register your school to vote in the 2014 Scottish Book Awards.

HAPPY INTERNATIONAL LITERACY DAY!

Thank you to Anna Shimmield from Milton of Leys for the link to this resource.

If you read our post on Choosing a ‘good-fit’ text using the IPICK strategy, you’ll know that learners should be supported in selecting an engaging text that will promote enthusiasm around reading.

The BOOKMATCH strategy is another process that can be used to teach learners in the upper primary/ secondary  how to select a ‘good-fit’ text.

CLICK HERE for a link to suggested lessons which will support you in teaching the BOOKMARK strategy for text selection.

The following Literacy CPD events during the September inset days still have spaces available.

The Highland Literacy Group are co-ordinating three CPD events during inset on September 25th and 26th 2014.

Over the past two sessions, The Highland Literacy Group have been refreshing the support materials available to practitioners. We have updated our Probationer programme accordingly for the 2014/2015 session, and would like to offer supplementary training to complement the original HLP training programme. We are running an event called ‘Literacy Across Learning – Primary‘ on the CPD calendar which will introduce some of the new materials, including: Literacy Across Learning, Media Literacy and Higher Order Thinking.  This event is open to practitioners within the Primary sector.

Thursday 25th September 2014 – 09:30 – 15:30 – Merkinch Community Centre, Inverness

During the September inset we are again offering ‘Big Writing’ – hosted by Big Writing trainer, Anne Glennie. The whole-day event aims to provide practitioners with a programme which can be used to develop writing, including guidance on learning, teaching and assessment. The course costs £37 per head, and can be found on the CPD calendar. These events are open to Primary and Secondary colleagues.

Thursday 25th September – 09:30 – 15:30 – Mount Pleasant Primary, Thurso
Friday 26th September 2014 – 09:30 – 15:30 – Inshes Primary School, Inverness

All events can be found in the CPD calendar – put ‘Literacy’ into the Keyword box within the Search Panel. Click the image at the top of this post to access the Highland CPD Website.

Thank you to Peter Fenton from the EAL Highland team for giving us a heads-up to this link.

Another resource that can be used – but this time on the Interactive Whiteboard – to support questioning.

The Question Matrix can be used with individuals, small groups or the whole class. This would be ideal for topical discussions or textual analysis during Guided Reading.

CLICK HERE for a link to the Question Matrix resource.

As you’re looking over your plans for next week, here’s an important date for your calendar . . .

Next Monday, 8th September 2014, people across the world will celebrate International Literacy Day, promoting Literacy for All.

Why not celebrate International Literacy Day within your class or as a school using some of the ideas below?  It’s a great opportunity for an Interdisciplinary Topic, encompassing Literacy, RME, Social Studies and Expressive Arts experiences and outcomes, as well as links with Global Citizenship and ECO. You could . . .

– Host a ‘book drive’ or a whole school ‘book swap’ in which children can choose a new book to read and enjoy

– Have a ‘book buddies’ morning – working with a different class in the school e.g. P1 and P4

– Invite a member of the local community e.g. local councillor, road crossing patrol, postman to come and share a story with the class

– Use the Global Dimension website to access resources to support Global Citizenship and Sustainable Development

– Celebrate cultures and diversity through each class hosting a different themed event from a country – CLICK HERE for an EXCELLENT link with stories linked to countries across the world.

CLICK HERE for TES and TES iBoard resources for ILD.

Leave a comment to let us know of any resources that you are aware of to support International Literacy Day.

How do you support learners in making a ‘good-fit’ choice when choosing a text for independent reading?

‘The Daily 5‘ by Gail Boushey and Joan Moser is packed full of fantastic structural techniques to support your literacy programmes.

The I PICK strategy is used to teach learners how to select a text that is a ‘good-fit’ for them.

A PowerPoint template on how to introduce this strategy can be found below.

CLICK HERE – I PICK PowerPoint

The theme of questioning and higher order thinking has been a focus in some of our blog posts this month.

Working with the new PGDE Primary students at UHI today on Literacy in the Early Years, it was highlighted that developing the required questioning vocabulary is crucial in the early stages of learning – providing learners with the opportunity to ask and answer questions. This is also highlighted in the POLAAR resource from Education Scotland.

The following resource – very simple yet visually engaging – can be found on a fantastic website mrspancake.com. Used with the class during a range of lessons including guided reading, individual learning conferences and numeracy lessons, question bubbles are a visual way to introduce questioning vocabulary.

CLICK HERE – Question Bubbles Mrs Pancake

Many of the resources are free; however, the website kindly accepts donations.

Let us know of any resources you use to promote questioning in the Early Years by leaving a comment.